Today is Remembrance Day in Great Britain. I will be using the two minute silence to remember my late father who fought in Burma during the Second World War. It was an experience he seldom spoke of, in common I believe with all his compatriots, and one whose horror I can only imagine. He was a quiet, steadfast and honourable man whose life - like those of everyone at that time - was completely changed by the war.

The poppies in the photograph used to grow in the garden of my father's brother. He too fought during that war, as did their elder brother who was captured early on and spent five years incarcerated in German prisoner-of-war camps - a totally different kind of experience, but equally as terrible.

I believe it is important to remember these people and what they stood for, their simple yet passionate love of life and other people, and their essential goodness in trying to preserve the very best of it for future generations.